stephanie looking up

Lazy Krakatoa. Colobus monkey in the village. Painting my toe nails and babysitting Kujo as we were getting ready for Joyce's engagment party.  Charles's beautiful 90-something grandmum, who we went to visit on the weekend. Charles's hair cutting shop in Fiema.

I have officially picked favourites. One of the groups that I follow named Winter has only two infants – a girl named Villain and a boy named Iron Man, each around 7 months old. Watching them is nothing but delightful as they mischievously bounce around and bounce around in all their goofy glory.  This week brought two stories about Iron Man. The Fall.   Iron man fell from a tree 20 meters or so high, nearly on top of my head. Thankfully at the time I was looking up and saw him falling - as if in slow motion he was looking at me with his black cape floating out around him like a parachute. I stepped back just in time and he landed at my feet. I immediately backed far away expecting that the adults would come down from the tree, and indeed his mom, Isbjorn, rushed down to the ground. Iron man didn’t move, didn’t make a noise, and then slowly rolled onto his back. I thought he was dead and I very nearly burst into tears right there, my heart broken. His mom licked his face, and ge

 Xena Mona Monkey!  Monkeys eating clay in the village, and people chasing a chicken.  They were both equally as surprised to see the other.  

Sunday is our day off - that is, we don’t go into the forest. I enjoyed a nice sleep-in, and by 7 am was dressed and typing away on the porch of our humble bungalow. I received a greeting from a girl named Patience, who was on her way to her farm - a greeting that she sneakily turned into a typing lesson, and by default also a spelling and grammar lesson. At 8 am I received a visit from Robert, who had come to receive his weekly pay. At 9:30 we left to walk to Boabeng to make foufou with Nana Amua only to find that he was not at home, so back to the bungalow we went. Instead I made our usual Sunday omlettes (with olives, oooo!!!!!). From 11 until 3 I did my best to review GPS points and mapping data to sort out some problems with mysteriously inaccurate data that I am having - to little avail, I was mostly discouraged. Moving on, I sat on my bedroom floor for a record-breaking hour and a half while I prepared 50 more fecal collection kits. Then the kitchen endured a deep cleaning, and

Today I watched a subadult male named Persimon engage in a beautiful long embrace with a small infant male named Setchi. A man from Boabeng brought us a large loaf of whole wheat bread from Kumasi – which was moldy yet a beautifully thoughtful and much appreciated gift nonetheless.  At lunch I watched a small boy sing with his grandma as she did laundry, helping by handing her the clothes pins as she hung the laundry on the line. Yesterday my assistant Andy got her hair cut by Charles, who is a hairdresser in Fiema when he is not working for me. He swiftly cut eight inches off her hair with no fewer than two snips of the scissors. Before dinner today I meticulously evened out Andy’s haircut. 

On this fine  Thursday  night the power is out again. I am sitting on my floor eating popcorn and drinking wine while numbering poop samples by headlamp light, and entering them into excel.

 We are proud of the gazebo we strung up on the porch. Hoorah for doing work on the porch in the evenings! We visited  Kintampo Waterfalls  on Sunday  (he man on the left is our driver Atta). Kintampo Waterfalls  The 'so ni-ice' girls, and my new dress!